Talk:Paranormal activity

RfC: Should this page redirect to the 2007 film?

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

There is rough consensus to have the redirect point to the film. AlbinoFerret 22:19, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

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At the moment, this page redirects to Paranormal, a general article about paranormal phenomena. There have been numerous attempts to redirect the search "Paranormal activity" to Paranormal Activity, an article about the 2007 film. These attempts are invariably reverted, most recently with the comment that the change was done without consensus. Yet no attempt has ever been made to determine actual consensus. So I ask: Should "Paranormal activity" redirect to "Paranormal Activity" as a simple capitalization shift? Note that each of the articles in question already contains a hatnote referring to the other. Krychek (talk) 18:45, 8 May 2015 (UTC)

Agree - It seems to me, if someone includes the word "activity" in their search, they are probably looking for the film. The film page receives far more hits, and the title of that page is much closer to the search term that is currently being hijacked. Krychek (talk) 18:49, 8 May 2015 (UTC)

Agree - per Krycheck. Also I think that the term shouldn't link to soemthing different, because of ONE (uncapitalized) letter!! So yeah, definitely agree. Rayukk (talk) 20:18, 13 May 2015 (UTC)

If you type in "paranormal activity" into the search box with no capitals you also get sent to this redirect. 73.223.96.73 (talk) 05:52, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

Agree per both reasons above. -Newyorkadam (talk) 05:15, 17 May 2015 (UTC)Newyorkadam

Not so sure - Wait, are you saying that you believe that people typing in "Paranormal activity" (with no capital letter A on Activity) should be redirected to the movie "Paranormal Activity"? Because I do not get the sense that this is necessarily the case— the expression/ term "paranormal activity" predates the movie by decades, of course, and my sense is that people are not at all unlikely to type in "paranormal activity" and expect to get something like the article "Paranormal" rather than the film. I also think that anyone searching for the movie is very likely to type in the movie's title with a capital "A" on "activity", and will not be at all surprised if they use a lower-case "a" and end up at "Paranormal" instead first. If my understanding of the RfC is correct, then I am afraid I do not agree. But please correct me if my understanding is not clear here. KDS4444^Talk 14:03, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

I can't speak for others, of course, but I personally never use caps anywhere in the WP search field. I wonder what the statistics are on this for WP searches in general. Krychek (talk) 22:03, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

Agree -- KDS4444 makes a strong case, but then again the original proposal makes sense as well. I generally type things in all lowercase, so I imagine this would be helpful. Eman235/talk 00:55, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

• For what it is worth, the Wikipedia precedents are inconsistent at best: see full metal jacket, taxi driver, ginger snaps, source code (best counter example), control room, high noon, slow motion, black widow (that one is crazy), etc. KDS4444^Talk 05:25, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

But if you were actually looking for "paranormal activity", then being redirected to the film would be unhelpful. 73.223.96.73 (talk) 07:45, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

Disagree. Note that because of how Wikipedia works, both "paranormal activity" and "Paranormal activity" will go to the redirect page. Without capitalization, the phrase "paranormal activity" primarily refers to activity of the paranormal. If you look at the incoming links for the redirect page, they are all referring to the general term, not the film. I think we should prioritize the phrase's definition over the possible miscapitalization. The redirect hatnote on Paranormal should be sufficient for readers seeking the film. 73.223.96.73 (talk) 05:46, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

Keeping a faulty redirect because the incoming links are also faulty seems like a case of two wrongs failing to make a right. Krychek (talk) 22:03, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

However, this is the case of keeping a perfectly valid redirect because it has proven to be useful. 73.223.96.73 (talk) 07:42, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

...So I've fixed all those links except for Talk and User pages. Now it's not an issue. Krychek (talk) 16:34, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

You should probably wait to "fix" the links until the RfC concludes. Currently there is no consensus to change the redirect. Anyway, my point was that "paranormal activity" (lowercase) is in practice used to mean, well, paranormal activity. 73.223.96.73 (talk) 07:27, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

I don't mind if we wait on those changes, as long as you're the one doing all the work of un-reverting my edits. Krychek (talk) 20:13, 26 May 2015 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.